The FAA defines the many requirements for achieving FAA certification of a new or modified aircraft. As defined in FAA Order 8110.4 and additional related writings, an aircraft can be “Type Certified” when there is proof that the aircraft is compliant with every applicable rule during every condition for which the aircraft is designed to operate. The process required to identify the applicable rules and document design compliance is called “Type Certification” and is governed by federal law.
The first difficulty with certification can be the complexity of the process required to identify the applicable rules in a situation where each design detail can be affected by several specific rules. Under FAA Order 8110.4, the FAA requires the applicant to submit a certification plan that identifies all of the rules that apply to each part of the design. Without expert involvement, the applicability of specific rules can be difficult to ascertain due to the large number of rules (some with several amendments), the requirements for compliance with an individual rule may not be obvious, and the interactions between different rules are often affected by the versions of the rules applicable to a particular aircraft.
Although the FAA exclusively reserves the right to determine if a particular configuration is compliant with the applicable rules, they use a system of delegations defined under FAA Order 8100.9 and additional related writings to designate Authorized Representatives (AR). Those ARs are delegated authority in specific functional areas to complete findings of compliance on behalf of the FAA.
Certification plan development can also be limited by the level of detail included in the design proposal. The rules that “belong” in the certification plan may change as the design matures, so the certification plan must have some flexibility to document changes in the requirements (and the compliance plan) as the product definition is completed. This can be a significant limitation with traditional planning tools.
Typically, the certification plan can be developed on paper. The paper plan does not reflect the dynamic nature of the engineering environment, can be cumbersome to develop and distribute, can be difficult to revise and coordinate, and can be especially hindered when there are wide geographic separations between the engineering team and the FAA approvers. Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a software system for managing all these aspects of the FAA certification process.